Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1887-09-17

way silently to the waste-paper basket and
lit the fire.
Mary thanked heaven every night that
she had found such husband his mother
that she had so good a son. As for him
he was very happy. Mary was the best OF
wives, and he was so content with his lot
that he hardly grieved over what was her
one secret sorrow-that they had no chill
dren.
He would have liked son TO inherit
his genius; she yearned for a daughter to
be az blessed as she was. For the rest they
had 10 troubles, or only few. Sometimes
he felt rs if he were rather unappreciated,
that with all his efforts art was not puri-
iied-that the public taste was growing
coarse and depraved They passed his
large biblical or allegorical pictures by,
and iocked to some realistic, horrible or
sensual picture-these were his epithets for
them. Perhaps the world would not have
echoed them.
The papers had nasty trick of sneering
at his Smooth sentimentalism, his ''impos-
sible anatomy" and ESQ on He only
thought the world growing bad, but il dis
tressed him little to see the people led
astray and pure art despised. Mary felt it
too, but she managed to soothe him at
home with her boundless sympathy and
the innocent fiattery of her belief in him.
He had been prudent, had made good in
vestments and, with his fathers legacy,
was rich enough, if not exceedingly so.
When he had passed his forty fifth birth
day his mother died as gently as she de-
served to do, mildly giving up life which
ha1 haap ttannllil t,-ht.h ha1 haa,,
lived, perhaps, not in the highest air, but
had been very sweet and wholesome in its
narrow, guarded sphere. Sebastian felt her
loss as good sons ought; but he had a
great consolation, which he repeated con-
stantly to himself-he had done his duty
throughout; he had made her happy. In
this, as in other respects, he had nothing
TO reproach himself with.
He did not exhibit his full number OF
pictures at the next Academy exhibition,
but rumor put about that he was
giving up, that he had painted himself
out, reused him to great energy and de-
termination to disabuse the public mind of
SO absurd an idea !; and the year following
he worked so industriously at covering his
large canvases that his wife trembled for
his health. She dreaded his falling a
martyr to the demands of his art; but Sc
bastian's was not an exhausting muse he
had none of the irritability, the restless
ness, the fits of Incidence and dependency
that genius knows That genius of his, in
which he himself and Maryland no one
else III the world-so devoutly believed,
was only talent dressed up, only the fatal
facility of his youth, which his old mother
t.ArAsr 1,I i
in his student days. And talent is not cx-
hausting; it has none of the maddening
demands, the fierce contradictions OF
genius; it goes hand-in-hand very well
with industry and wealth.
what truly awful picture. Whose
is it, and what is it supposed to represent -
One young art student put this question
to another in the Academy of only few
years since, as they paused in front Of Il
vast and highly-colored canvas.
Don't you know? Whose else could ii
be ?" answered the other, laughing. "The
inimitable Fellowes, Il. A., of course
| though he has rather surpassed himself
this year. AN Allegory of Life and
Death he calls it. Blessed if | can make
out anything but a lot of disiointed
sprawling creatures in topping drapery
You need never ask who has painted any
particularly awful picture-sdfft to find its
an r. A., and generally Fellowes"
An elder man joined them at the mo.
ment-;l rather rough-looking, gray-beard
ed man with bright eyes; an artist work
ing his way up doggedly, by means of the
sort of pictures which Sebastian Fellowe.
had always denounced.
Don't talk so loud, you fellows he
said, tapping one of them on the shoulder
|. L saw the painter of this lovely acre o
canvas close by Just now He generally
haunts the neighborhood of his works o
| art; and your remarks might be painful"
But surely picture exhibited pub
licly on the line is public property; and
shouldn't have thought, Mr. Murray, thai
you would be so very tender over old Eel
loves. Aren't you and he ut dagger,
drawn"
"Ayl But somehow Eve a sort of compass
sion for him; this exhibition is rather
| pathetic to me. He has got so hopelesslH
past his age, and he goes on believing il
himself, and thinking that others do ST
too; besides, he's really good sort Of
worthy soul, and he looks haggard ana
altered. He's lost all his complacent dig
nifty. Some one says that his wife dice
after 4 long illness, while he was painting
| that poor old daub-that figures taker
from her, they say"
The three moved on talking. They die
not notice a tail man who leaned on tn,
rail near the Zig picture, with his heaC
down. \ good many people might hav,
failed to recognize Sebastian Fellowes, one,
SO sleek, prosperous, stately; he had arowI
thin, gray, haggard-looking all ut once. 4
year and half ago the discovery that hi
wife-his other self, his Mary, who adorec
him and was to him the pearl of al
womankind in spite of her 30 years an,
faded prettiness, in spite of her gray hair
and the altered lines of her once plum
and comely figure-that she was marked
out for death that few short years Il
most, perhaps months, of growing torture
would end the happy communion between
them, unspoilt, undisturbed for almos
thirty years, which seemed but day 70
the love they bore each other this knowl
edge, the cruel tragedy of swiftly-overtak
ing fate, crushed all the happiness out O
the husbands life, and brought suddenl,
upon him the certainty of hopeless woe
He kept it to himself, as Il man must whel
II the woman is to be spared he was cheer
full, hopeful to her, studiously common
place for n long time, as if he did not Sc
or know Of any change; but this brok
down-he found that it distressed her
that she would be relieved if they woul,
share the burden, and they talked togethe
of the days that were to come, and tried t
comfort each other with the religion whicl
they had worn all their lives without par
ticularly feeling the need of it, perhaps
but which they now wanted to make SUI
ficient shelter against despair.
All, we talk and talk, we preaci, an,
pray, but when the heart is. cold and sick
and we stand shivering at the edge of
dark precipice, over which we soon mus
go, how difficult it is to comfort our soul
with any of the phrases which we calle
beliefs, and the consultations which ayaile,
for little sorrows! These were good. oil
thodox, believing souls; but there was
voice not to be silenced, that kept erwin
on in the wakeful, weeping heart of each
The wife was the first consoled; patienc
came with the rapidly-approaching end
the husband, who took the part of the on
who sustains and comforts, was most i
need Of support. He found melanchol
relief at times in painting; he woul
| sanctif- his oriof bo sd a,,J ,,,,l.a o...